Video: Armed Traveller gangs issue brutal threats to each other
forum image hostingArmed with guns, knives and bombs two Traveller gangs have issued a stream of video threats against each other.
The videos, one issued from a Dublin-based gang, the other by a gang from another part of Leinster, appeared this week and threats of serious harm were issued by both sides.
There has been an ongoing feud between both gangs that has resulted in assaults but this latest pair of videos shows that the dispute may be entering a new, far more serious, phase.
The first part of the below video shows a group of men with a large arsenal of firearms, including shotguns, automatic weapons and ammunition.
They name a person before saying 'You said six weeks ago it was only a matter of time (that) you would get your brothers-in-law involved... They are involved and make the best of them.
'You send your young fellas acting like men - we will treat them like men.
'You come to our road - prepare for what you're seeing'.
The other gang responded days later, with an equally chilling clip, which is also included below.
A masked man, brandishing a machete, says: 'You are threatening that you are going to shoot again. My friend, this is what is waiting for you. We will end this once and for all.
'If we see you around the shops you will get that', he adds, waving the weapon.
'If we see you in a pub, any pub, you will get that,' he says, holding a shotgun and cartridges.
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Thugs held father of one down and tried to crucify him
greenshotMasked raiders tried to nail Paul Harbinson’s feet to the floor in a ghoulish ‘crucifixion.’
The 23-year-old was still reeling from the horror of having 10-inch nails hammered through the palms of his hands as his attackers attempted to pin him to kitchen floor of his home.
The barbaric attack has plumbed new depths in a community numbed by decades of paramilitary-style attacks.
Dragged from the sofa of his home at Florence Walk in north Belfast on Thursday evening by a gang of masked men, he was beaten, held down and forced to lay his hands palms up on the kitchen counter as 10-inch nails were driven through both hands.
Not content with the cruelty inflicted, the gang leader then ordered for the Shankill man’s shoes and socks to be removed as they set about a repeat performance on his feet.
Today the Sunday World reveals the full extent of the attack.
Speaking exclusively from a secret location outside Belfast the father of one spoke of his horrific ordeal and revealed how he managed to escape a full crucifixion.
“I was in shock, adrenalin running through me so I didn’t really feel anything,” he said.
“But when I heard him saying about my socks and shoes I realised they were going to hammer my feet to the floor as well and that’s when I reacted. I tried to pull my hands from the counter, but they were nailed tight,” Paul told the Sunday World.
“They started beating the f**k out of me so I pulled my head in and just kept jumping around the place trying to make sure they couldn’t get my feet, and they gave up.”
Paul, whose family is from the Shankill area, had just returned from staying at his girlfriend’s house when the monsters pounced.
“We had just sat down after putting the child to bed when the back door came flying in,” he recalled.
“The next thing I know I am dragged off the settee. Someone was screaming ‘get into the f**king kitchen’.
“I hadn’t a clue what was going on, I was asking them what I was supposed to have done, but they just kept screaming. They told me to put my hands out and when I refused he told me if I didn’t he would put the hammer right through my face.
“When I saw the bag of nails I knew, the next thing the nails were getting hammered through my hands and for some reason I couldn’t feel a thing, I just watched. It didn’t hurt, it was the adrenaline. I can feel them now though, the pain is bad.”
Paul’s new girlfriend Amy was dragged into the hall and forced to sit on the stairs while a member of the gang watched over her.
They tried to take her from the house, but she pleaded with them to let her stay as she had a one-year-old son sleeping upstairs.
“I was terrified, but I was trying not to cry or scream,” she said.
“I sat with my head in my hands as I heard them beating Paul. When I heard them saying about taking his shoes off I knew what they were doing to him and there was nothing I could do. I was terrified for him and my wee one”
Paul was nailed to the kitchen counter for almost one hour until the fire service came to his rescue.
One of the 10-inch nails was removed from the kitchen worktop by industrial clippers. The other, which had been embedded in the cupboard below, had to be electrically sawn off .
“I am just glad that my girlfriend was there with me because I wouldn’t have been able to call for help. I would have been there for I don’t know how long before someone came to help.
“I genuinely don’t know why this has been done to me. I have done nothing to deserve this and they have given me no reason for the attack. The people who did this to me are sick.”
In the wake of the sickening attack, local sources laid the blame on the UDA in the Lower Shankill area, headed up by thugs Mo Courtney and Matt Kincaid.
Loyalist sources also claim that the UDA have since accused Paul of drug dealing and breaking into people’s houses, stating this is the reason he was assaulted and that he had received a warning three weeks ago.
Paul denies all of their claims.
“I have never sold drugs or meth in my life,” he declared.
“I used to buy the illegal high 4CMC of the internet, but I never sold to anyone, they were for me and my mates and that was about a year ago. As for housebreaking, never, I just wouldn’t do that, I wouldn’t steal.
“To be honest I don’t know who attacked me because I haven’t been back and my phone was taken. UVF or UDA, it doesn’t matter to me at this stage because no-one should do something like this to anyone. It’s sick.”
He said the truth about the attack will emerge.
“I genuinely don’t know why this was done to me, I have always kept myself to myself in the Shankill, I never socialised there or anything and I only moved back. I really have no idea but I will find out, it’s only a matter of time before someone spills,” he explained.
Paul, who has no criminal convictions, has insisted he will never return to the area he was born and raised.
“Whoever did this can go f**k themselves, the lot of them can. I will never be back, what way is that to live? I just wish my family would leave too.”
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'Fat' Freddie Thompson in hiding after death threat
photo hosting sitesGangster Fat Freddie Thompson is in hiding after gardai warned of a threat on his life following his release from prison last week.
Thompson was released from Mountjoy Prison last Saturday but before he left the jail, Gardai informed him that that his life was in danger.
The 35-year is said to be 'paranoid and terrified' by the threat and there are conflicting reports regarding his whereabouts, with Dublin and Birmingham both mentioned as possible locations for his hideout.
Several factions may want to kill Thompson, with his gang at the centre of the feud in Crumlin that has claimed 15 lives since 2000.
Christy Kinihan's associates may also want to target Thompson as they dislike the fact that his high profile attracts unwanted Garda attention.
Thompson was behind bars for an attack on a man in a pub on Cork Street in the city in 2013. He was extradited from the Netherlands in May of 2014 and was immediately placed in custody before being hit with a 20-month sentence for his involvement in the pub brawl.
However, he was released after just 15 months.
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upload image onlineGangland target Jay O’Connor has fled to Spain where he is in hiding after a rival gang launched a plot to kill him.
37-year-old O’Connor was due to return to Dublin from the UK last Thursday but instead chose to remain hiding.The long-running dispute between Jason 'Jay' O'Connor and rival gangster David 'Gully' Goulding has already claimed one live so far this year.
The two former friends were both part of the Westies mob which wreaked havoc in west Dublin in the 1990s.
When the gang imploded the two men went their separate ways, Goulding linked up with a Coolock-based faction of the gang while O’Connor remained loyal to the Glennons.
Following the murder of an innocent man in a case of mistaken identity earlier this year tensions have reached fever pitch with gardai working overtime in an attempt to quell tensions in west Dublin.
O’Connor became aware of a threat on his life on the 12th of June this year and has been keeping a low profile ever since.
A source told the Sun that “There has been no sign of O’Connor but his enemies are driving around without a care in the world.
“He was meant to come back last week, but he’s now decided to stay away because there is a serious threat against him at the moment.
“People might think O’Connor is terrified of someone targeting him but the reality is he has a very good alibi if he’s out of the country and one of his enemies is taken out.”
The Sun reports that the gangster has been staying at his heavily fortified, Whitestown home which boasts CCTV and bulletproof windows.
O’Connor has a number of high profile allies in Dublin, including Fat Freddy Thompson’s south inner-city mob and gardai fear that the hood could call in certain “favours” from these associates.
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Gardai find €60,000 of drugs at house after landlord reports burglary
Gardai in Palmerstown discovered €60,000 of drugs after being called to a house to investigate a burglary.
The bizarre incident unfolded in the early hours of the morning in Palmerstown, west Dublin, on Friday when the landlord called gardai after becoming suspicious that someone had broken into his house where he was sub-letting a room.
When officers from Ballyfermot Garda Station entered the room which the landlord had thought had been broken into, gardai discovered paraphernalia linked to drug dealing and obtained a search warrant which they later executed.
Gardai searched the room and discovered the large drugs haul.
In a follow-up operation on Friday afternoon, a Ballyfermot man aged in his early 20s was arrested.
The suspect was released without charge over the weekend and a file will now be prepared for the DPP.
"The landlord in this case had nothing to do with the drugs at all. He became suspicious that a burglary had taken place in his property.
"The officers at the scene quickly established that no one had broken into the room that he was concerned about but quickly realised that there were drugs in the room and then acted in a prompt manner and now these drugs are off the street," a source explained.
